1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an apparatus and method for controlling the ringtone, camera, and communication functions of a mobile terminal using a Near Field Communication (NFC) chip module and an external Radio Frequency (RF) reader.
2. Description of the Related Art
NFC technology has been currently developed by an industrial consortium under the name of an NFC forum (http://www.nfc-forum.org).
NFC technology starts from Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technology (radio identification), and uses an NFC element having a contactless-type communication interface (for transmitting/receiving data in a contactless manner) and various types of operation modes, that is, reader mode, card emulation mode and device mode.
In reader mode, that is, in active mode, such an NFC element operates like a conventional RFID reader in order to access an RFID chip (especially, a chip card or a contactless tag) when writing or reading is performed on the RFID chip.
Further, an RF (contactless-type) technology includes a Universal Subscriber Identity Module (USIM) which uses a method similar to an NFC method.
The technology is formed using the exchange of information between an RF reader and a USIM. Since the RF (contactless type) area of the USIM in a mobile terminal directly transmits a result value to the RF reader after processing the command of the RF reader, the contact-type section in which communication with the mobile terminal is actually performed cannot be known.
For example, when a reader instructs a USIM to restrict the camera function of a mobile terminal using an RF (contactless type), the RF area of the USIM primarily cannot perform communication with a contact section which transmits/receives at least one command in the mobile terminal even though the RF area of the USIM receives the command, so that a command indicative of the restriction of the camera function cannot be transmitted to the mobile terminal.
Therefore, there is an urgent need for the development of an apparatus and method for controlling a mobile terminal using NFC, which enables NFC service to be specialized, based on RF service using an external RF reader.